Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses.
Clément, I appreciate your mentioning northwestern Ontario as an important part of the Métis Nation.
I also want to thank you, John, for sending me this book. I tried to start it the past few nights and realized it was a page-turner and something I shouldn't be reading late at night. I tried to get to a bit of it before we met, but I only received it a couple of days ago. I appreciate that.
Marc, you raised an interesting point, as did Clém, in your speech about land issues. I just want to put out at the forefront here that one of the things the committee is drawing closer to looking at is land-use modernization and sustainable economic development.
Unfortunately, I'm not, as you can well understand, in a position to discuss litigation, but I want to make it clear to you--and certainly, Marc, with regard to your point--that I think the land issue is on the table to the extent that it's resolved, and I see this potential study as something that is going to take some time. So I hope we'll be back and able to address that to a certain extent. Now probably isn't the time. I note that you do have a 1.3 million-acre land base in Alberta. Perhaps we'll visit that at that time.
But what we were thinking about was this constellation, if you will, of legal instruments and, certainly with respect to the Métis Nation, policy instruments that build on sustainable economic development.
I think what we've heard from you today will compel us to take a more serious look at a component that includes policy instruments. I'm going to talk a little bit about that here.
Clém, flowing from the 2008 Métis Nation protocol, I note there were some exchanges between you and the Prime Minister about things like the funding from the Clarence Campeau development fund, which came from the federal government, and the Metis Economic Development Organization. I suspect these are part and parcel of the important work you did, as you said, with Minister Strahl when he was the minister responsible for Indian Affairs. That was the title at that time, and of course, there was Minister Duncan.
I'm going to stop there and just get you to expound on those two organizations or funds. Talk a little bit about the substantive dimensions of economic development and, notably, how you have done very well in labour force participation in financial institutions.
I'll let you go with that, Clém.